The skill of this odd-tempered, shabby old man was sometimes sought by the jeweller who kept the more ostentatious shop in the High Street; but before Darley would undertake any ‘tickle’ piece of delicate workmanship for the other, he sneered at his ignorance, and taunted and abused him well.  Yet he had soft places in his heart, and Hester Rose had found her way to one by her patient, enduring kindness to his bed-ridden niece.  He never snarled at her as he did at too many; and on the few occasions when she had asked him to do anything for her, he had seemed as if she were conferring the favour on him, not he on her, and only made the smallest possible charge.

She found him now sitting where he could catch the most light for his work, spectacles on nose, and microscope in hand.

He took her watch, and examined it carefully without a word in reply to her.  Then he began to open it and take it to pieces, in order to ascertain the nature of the mischief.

Suddenly he heard her catch her breath with a checked sound of surprise.  He looked at her from above his spectacles; she was holding a watch in her hand which she had just taken up off the counter.

‘What’s amiss wi’ thee now?’ said Darley.  ’Hast ta niver seen a watch o’ that mak’ afore? or is it them letters on t’ back, as is so wonderful?’

Yes, it was those letters—­that interlaced, old-fashioned cipher.  That Z. H. that she knew of old stood for Zachary Hepburn, Philip’s father.  She knew how Philip valued this watch.  She remembered having seen it in his hands the very day before his disappearance, when he was looking at the time in his annoyance at Sylvia’s detention in her walk with baby.  Hester had no doubt that he had taken this watch as a matter of course away with him.  She felt sure that he would not part with this relic of his dead father on any slight necessity.  Where, then, was Philip?—­by what chance of life or death had this, his valued property, found its way once more to Monkshaven?

‘Where did yo’ get this?’ she asked, in as quiet a manner as she could assume, sick with eagerness as she was.

To no one else would Darley have answered such a question.  He made a mystery of most of his dealings; not that he had anything to conceal, but simply because he delighted in concealment.  He took it out of her hands, looked at the number marked inside, and the maker’s name—­’Natteau Gent, York’—­and then replied,—­

‘A man brought it me yesterday, at nightfall, for t’ sell it.  It’s a matter o’ forty years old.  Natteau Gent has been dead and in his grave pretty nigh as long as that.  But he did his work well when he were alive; and so I gave him as brought it for t’ sell about as much as it were worth, i’ good coin.  A tried him first i’ t’ bartering line, but he wouldn’t bite; like enough he wanted food,—­many a one does now-a-days.’

‘Who was he?’ gasped Hester.

‘Bless t’ woman! how should I know?’